Chapter 30: Everyone Has Hidden Secrets

By the time Li Lin returned from the county town to Shangtikou Village, it was already evening, and he saw the Tree Immortal Lady lingering at the village entrance.

At that moment, the Tree Immortal Lady saw him as well, then turned and slowly floated away.

Her long, green snake tail swayed back and forth before Li Lin.

Li Lin hurried after her, walking behind the Tree Immortal Lady, and asked with a smile, "Is the Tree Immortal Lady waiting for me?"

The Tree Immortal Lady said nothing; instead, she returned to the altar and vanished from sight.

Tsk tsk, tsundere!

Li Lin chuckled and returned to his own home.

Having been away for several days, everything in the house remained exactly as it was; it seemed no one had entered to rummage through it.

He even opened the wardrobe to check; the six ingots of gold given by Wang Tianyou were still inside.

He stretched and lay directly on the bed to sleep.

He had been rushing about outside these past few days, facing the threat to his life, with emotions extremely tense, swinging wildly up and down, which had utterly exhausted him.

He slept straight through until noon the next day before getting up.

Just as he was about to go to the courtyard to exercise, he saw Zhao Xiaohu standing guard outside the fence.

"Lin Ge!"

Zhao Xiaohu was very happy to see Li Lin.

His complexion looked much better now, which made Li Lin somewhat puzzled.

According to his estimation, Zhao Xiaohu had been struck by the Gowned Apparition's Soul-Calling Technique twice; logically, his body should have been extremely depleted, yet he had recovered far faster than imagined.

Could this kid also be a talent?

"Xiaohu, how is the situation in the village during the days I was away?"

"Same as before!" Zhao Xiaohu said with a smile, "Many people heard that Lin Ge eliminated the wandering ghosts here and want to return."

Li Lin blinked, "So that means I'll have to move again very soon!"

"That's not necessary." Zhao Xiaohu lowered his voice and said, "The house you are living in now, after the previous family moved out, went missing; no one knows where they went."

Oh!

Li Lin stopped paying attention to that matter... He looked at Zhao Xiaohu and suddenly said, "I'm going to cook some Blood Rice to eat in a moment; you come over and eat some too."

"That's not good; that's for Spirit Hunters to eat." Although Zhao Xiaohu was also very curious about the taste of Blood Rice, he still shook his head.

"Just try it; I think you might have the talent to become a Spirit Hunter."

"Really?" Zhao Xiaohu's eyes lit up.

"Come in."

"Okay, okay." After Zhao Xiaohu came in, he immediately said, "Lin Ge, I'll help you wash the rice; I'll help you cook the meal."

He kept shouting excitedly.

"Fine, you make the meal."

Li Lin indeed wanted to take a little break.

Soon, the Blood Rice was cooked.

This thing greatly boosts blood and qi; ordinary people cannot eat much of it, so Li Lin only served him a small half-bowl.

Zhao Xiaohu, almost with an air of reverence, lifted the rice bowl and chewed the grains one by one slowly.

Not long after, Zhao Xiaohu finished the small half-bowl of Blood Rice.

Then he sat uneasily and quietly, waiting for Li Lin's 'verdict.'

After a while, some hot sweat appeared on Zhao Xiaohu's forehead, and his face turned slightly red.

Li Lin nodded; Zhao Xiaohu indeed possessed the talent to become a Spirit Hunter, but... not much, barely the kind that qualifies.

The first step to becoming a Spirit Hunter is being able to digest and withstand the effects of Blood Rice.

If an ordinary person finished this small half-bowl, their blood and qi would surely surge greatly, making them jump around, wanting only to find something to vent on.

Being able to sit quietly is qualification.

Then the second step is to see if the other person's body can contain 'Yin Qi.'

Li Lin extended his hand, pressed on the other's left wrist pulse point, and guided some Yin Qi inside.

Zhao Xiaohu shivered, but afterward, there were no other reactions.

Just passable.

If the two basic entry-level assessments were scored out of a hundred, Zhao Xiaohu barely passed, just crossing the sixty-point line.

He can indeed become a Spirit Hunter, but his achievements will be limited.

By the way, Li Lin's scores on both items were around eighty-five.

One item at eighty-five points seems merely a good level, nothing major.

But having both items at eighty-five points is excellent.

That is to say, he has no weaknesses; once he grows, he will be a proper hexagonal warrior.

Like Xu Saifeng, whom Li Lin killed, she was the type more easily accepting of Yin Qi, but her blood qi was not very strong; once she was approached... she couldn't even defeat Li Lin, a newcomer to the profession.

Li Lin looked at the expectant yet nervous Zhao Xiaohu and said, "You can!"

"Really?" Zhao Xiaohu suddenly jumped up, spinning around the room and shouting wildly, "I can become a Spirit Hunter, I can become a Spirit Hunter."

Li Lin smiled at him, and after the other calmed down a bit, said, "Go call Uncle Zhao over."

Mm-hmm!

Zhao Xiaohu nodded repeatedly, then dashed off like a streak of smoke, clearly extremely excited.

Not long after, Uncle Zhao hurried over, while Zhao Xiaohu waited outside the courtyard.

When my lord discusses matters, a brat has no right to listen.

Uncle Zhao sat across from Li Lin, his expression a mix of delight and nervousness.

"Does Xiaohu really have the talent to become a Spirit Hunter?"

Li Lin nodded lightly: "He does indeed. I just confirmed it specifically a moment ago."

Before practicing the Yin-Nurturing Heart Method, Li Lin had no way to confirm it, because he himself didn't have Yin Qi, so how could he test others?

But now he could.

Uncle Zhao's expression was unreadable; he let out a soft sigh, looking very hesitant.

Li Lin said: "A Spirit Hunter has the duty to discover and teach talented people to become new Spirit Hunters, but Uncle Zhao, you also know that the casualty rate in this line of work is very high."

Uncle Zhao nodded.

Spirit Hunters are greatly respected among the common folk; under normal circumstances, ordinary people are unwilling to come into any conflict with a Spirit Hunter.

But Spirit Hunters also have the duty to guard a region.

Someone new like Li Lin was stationed at Shangtikou Village.

"I can bring Xiaohu into the fold, and I can even directly teach him fist techniques, spear techniques, and even Spirit-Controlling Heart Methods right now," Li Lin said with a smile. "His circumstances are much better than mine were back then."

"But he doesn't have the same natural talent as you, Li Xiaolang, right!" Uncle Zhao asked in a low voice.

Li Lin hesitated for a moment, then still nodded.

This was a fact; there was no need to hide it. Telling the truth would let the other party make the right judgment.

"Can I think it over a bit more?"

"No problem." Li Lin smiled slightly: "But... Xiaohu isn't Aunt Hua's child, is he."

Uncle Zhao stared at Li Lin sharply, disbelief in his eyes: "How did you know that."

"That wandering apparition outside the village earlier, before she died, said something very interesting!" Li Lin said with a flat expression: "She said she missed Xiaohu very much, missed her own child dearly. But I felt something wasn't quite right... According to the old village chief, that wandering apparition outside the village had existed for over thirty years, and Xiaohu is only... thirteen. Isn't there something off here?"

"Nothing's off!" Uncle Zhao sighed: "Xiaohu is her child, that apparition's child."

Li Lin squinted his eyes and thought for a moment, then instinctively leaned his body back and sucked in a sharp breath.

Uncle Zhao was actually an Undead Knight!

"Then Aunt Hua..."

"Your Aunt Hua, when she was young, spent every day soaking in water planting rice seedlings and washing clothes. Later, it injured her to the bone. In a doctor's words, her womb was extremely cold, and she couldn't bear children."

Li Lin listened quietly.

"Then one day..." Uncle Zhao said in a low voice: "I got drunk. Because the villagers mocked my family for having no children, for being unable to bear offspring, I went outside the village and made a scene. In a daze, I lay with that apparition. One night, three months later, she called my name and, at the village entrance, handed Xiaohu over to me."

"Do the villagers know about this?"

"They don't." Uncle Zhao smiled slightly: "Xiaohu's appearance was abrupt, so I tricked them into thinking I had prayed to the Tree Immortal Lady, asking her to use magic to bestow us a child."

With Xiaohu's big-bearded face looking exactly like Uncle Zhao's, no one would suspect the two weren't blood-related.

Li Lin was silent for a moment, then asked: "I killed her, killed that apparition. Do you hate me?"

Uncle Zhao shook his head: "Before, she still had some awareness, but later she grew more and more insane, constantly killing the villagers. Now she even wants to take Xiaohu away. I've long regarded her as an enemy."

"Let's get back to the matter of Xiaohu." Li Lin's fingers tapped lightly on the table, using this method to emphasize his tone: "Xiaohu's body can contain Yin Qi; he's more likely to attract the attention of apparitions than ordinary people. Right now he's still a virgin, his Qi and blood are vigorous so it's manageable, but once he takes a wife and has children... he'll be easily harassed by apparitions. Becoming a Spirit Hunter can rid him of this trouble, but being a Spirit Hunter is itself a kind of trouble."

After a long silence, Uncle Zhao said: "I'll go back and discuss it some more with Aunt Hua."

"Alright!"

Li Lin stood up and saw the uncle and his son off, then picked up his conical hat, bamboo basket, and hoe. He was going up the mountain to dig up some 'weeds' for alchemy.

More than half of the Vitality Pills had already been eaten; he needed to prepare in advance, to plan ahead.

He carried his hoe into the mountains, walked a long loop, and the bamboo basket on his back was already full of medicinal herbs.

Just as he was thinking of heading back to the village, he spotted a graveyard, with a lot of fresh soil scattered around it.

He walked over and found that indeed a fresh grave had been robbed.

And the tombstone read: Tomb of the Wu Family's Sister Xiu Niang.

He looked down into the grave hole and found the coffin had already been opened, with Sister Xiu Niang's remains lying inside.

But... on the remains lay a brown, dried-up, paper-like thing.

What the heck was this?

(End of this chapter)